BY EMELI SANDE
IT wasn’t long after I arrived at Tororo Hospital that I was handed the admissions book for the children’s ward.
This busy medical centre in eastern Uganda sees a lot of sick children brought through its doors each week and as I looked through this document outlining the cause of their illnesses, I was shocked to see that the story was the same for almost every single entry – malaria, malaria, malaria.
The high rates of admissions for this deadly disease were frightening to see and it was obvious how much pressure it must put on the hospital’s very limited resources.
Seeing it all laid out in black and white showed just how non-stop the problem is.
I can’t imagine what a doctor or nurse must feel like looking at that book. It must be so difficult seeing the same thing day in, day out.
It was really overwhelming and the most shocking thing of all is that so many of these cases could be avoided.
I was in Uganda to see how Red Nose Day money is spent on raising awareness about preventable diseases, including malaria.
While great achievements have been made over the years, thanks to improved education and increased use of mosquito nets, it was obvious that there is still more work to do.
During my hospital visit, I was shown around by Sister Betty. She was an amazing lady, who was so resilient and optimistic.
Even though I began my university education training to be a doctor and eventually completed a degree in neuroscience, I had never seen a hospital like that in my life.
I’ve been in a few hospitals in different parts of the world but it’s the first time I have seen such poor facilities under so much pressure. It made me feel angry that so many of these cases are preventable.
On the ward I met Junior, whose one-year-old daughter Resina had been admitted for the second time with malaria. She had been having convulsions and was dehydrated from vomiting and diarrhoea.
Junior has mosquito nets in her home but the one she sleeps under with Resina is old and has holes in it, so doesn’t really protect them.
It must be so worrying for a mum to have the constant fear of malaria hanging over her, as well as having to worry about the day-to-day basics of getting food and water for her children.
Family members, especially children, sharing a net was a common story I heard. But the problem is that if they roll over in the night and have a hand or foot sticking out from underneath the net, or if they end up leaning against the side of it, they can still get bitten.
It’s so difficult because mothers are doing their best to keep their children safe.
Another lady I spoke to, Angella, said her two-year-old grandson Diphast has had to have blood transfusions because he has had malaria so many times. She has eight children and two grandchildren living in her house and can’t afford to buy nets for them all.
She told me her husband died and she is scared for the children’s future.
The stories I heard that day really made me realise how much we take the facilities we have here in the UK for granted.
If I think of any hospital I have been in, as soon as you have a baby, you have midwives who visit you and there are follow-ups and vaccine appointments. I can imagine being a new mother is scary enough but to have these other worries as well must be awful.
The biggest thing for me was speaking about it practically, about what can be done to help and a lot of it comes down to mosquito nets.
Sister Betty told me it would drastically reduce the admission levels if everyone had a net. That’s why Red Nose Day funds projects like Mifumi, which provides health care services in rural areas.
Thanks to staff at the health centre, more communities are learning about how to protect themselves from malaria.
Both Resina and Diphast recovered from malaria. But they are the lucky ones. Every two minutes a child is dying from the disease.
In this day and age, how can that be acceptable?
We are not talking about unpreventable diseases here. We are talking about something that can be easily prevented.
We are talking about saving millions of young lives with very practical solutions. What’s amazing is that however you support Red Nose Day – getting sponsored to do something, buying a nose or donating while watching the TV show – you can help to do something simple and tangible that can keep people safe night after night.